Creative Business Uses of Twitter

Hi Heather -

We posted about this on our blog and invited folks to chime in. That was almost a month ago and people are still posting comments. Great examples are @JetBlue, @goodlifeshared, @HRBlock, @Mzinga (disclosure they are a client)and @Zappos.

We have other clients on as well and we are working hard to help them make sense – and find value – in these new communities. (Ex's: @Q1Labs; @Moola)

For more examples and thoughts fromo the community on who is doing it right, please visit our post - and let us know what you think: http://tinyurl.com/3dvtqp

Looking forward to your cover story.

Kind regards,
Christine Perkett
President & Founder
PerkettPR Inc.

@missusp - my personal

@PerkettPR - our corporate for client news, tech/social media events updates, PR insights, etc.

Heather - we've created a corporate account at our company - @Mzinga - and so far, we've been able to successfully build not only strong relationship with new customers on Twitter, but also with influencers throughout the tech community. We inspired the community to follow our corporate entity by first establishing individual entities and building relationships, then offering corporate giveaways for follower milestones, such as our 25th and 50th follower, etc. This strategy has encouraged folks to follow us without the fear of us spamming. In addition, we have focused on Twitter topics that the community is interested in – trends, issues, questions, events – not just Tweets about our products or company. Again, it’s all about building a two-way relationship with the community members, and that takes conversation, not just “posts.”

Best,
Aaron (@astrout)

Excellent, Christine, Aaron thanks!

Heather, Jeremiah at Forrester also pointed out that HR Block uses Twitter too. I heard of another example, but I have to root for it. I also put Stephen in touch with Compete (for their data) and they may know of some examples too.

Scott

In addition to the above, you might take a look at @HRBlock, @SouthWestAir and @freshbooks, all of which are providing customer service through Twitter.

I look forward to the article!

Best,
-Alex
@alexdc

BT recently acquired well known security companies, Counterpane and INS and is now deep in the security market. They've started to use Twitter @securethinking to connect to the security industry and engage in meaningful conversation about where the industry is going.

Shany Seawright
http://twitter.com/sseawright

Hi Heather,

A really interesting use case is a company I've been working with called Evernote (http://www.evernote.com). Since the launch of our private beta in February, we have been using Twitter to solicit feedback from users, provide updates on the product, engage with users directly and invite interested folks into the beta.

At one point yesterday, "Evernote" was one of the top 10 twittered words according to Twitstat, and we currently have over 1600 followers.

Cheers,
Leonora

@evernote : Evernote account

@LeonoraMS: my personal

Hi Heather

Chris mentioned me above (I'm behind @goodlifeshared) and though it was worth chiming in here. You can see most of my thoughts in Perkett PR's blog above but thought I would mention a couple things.

1. We just started about a week ago, and we're still evolving. So may be fun to keep watching us as we learn as we go.

2. And the interesting thing is that we actually couldn't get our company name in our twitter name- so we went with our tagline- wonder if that will help or hurt us?

3. You're going to think that I'm her PR agent (I'm not!) but I've really enjoyed watching the success of @savvyauntie this past month. A story of a true auntrepreneur using all the tools at her dispostal to build some great buzz.

Look forward to seeing the article and happy to be a guinea pig if you want to
experiment with ideas/thoughts/angles.

Warm regards,

Tyson Goodridge
@goodridge

We at General Motors (@GMblogs) have been using Twitter since January. During the North American International Auto Show in Detroit we did live "Tweeting" from the press conferences so people not at the show could see what was being said real-time. We've done this for other events as well.

We also will Tweet GM product reviews from other media that is online.

What's been most successful for us, though, has been using Twitter for two-way communication with consumers. We usually try to Tweet some sort of question for our followers everyday. These questions can be vehicle-related (i.e. What's your favorite convertible?) or just for fun (i.e. What's your favorite roadside diner).

This two-way approach continues to work well for us and we've seen a number of people Tweeting more about GM because of our presence there.

Adam Denison
GM Social Media Communications
@AdamDenison
@GMblogs

At Iterative Designs ( http://www.iterativedesigns.com ) we use twitter as a means to notify team members when source code gets updated, sites and applications are deployed, testing is completed, and bugs identified. Essentially twitter has become our notification server for corporate processes and since it is constrained to 140 characters, it makes the publications focus on what matters not fluff.

We also have a corporate account @iterativedesign which we use for obtaining alpha/beta testers for our applications and follow up business opportunities.

I am a social media specialist at EMC Corporation and we are using and will be using Twitter in 2 ways.

twitter.com/emccorp - this will be used to push out news releases to anyone who follows so the media and our customers can keep track of what EMC is doing.

twitter.com/emcworld - this will be a twitter account for our annual EMC World event. We will be using it to communicate to participants, as well as non-attendees. We will be using it to send people to different on-site podcasts,blog posts by attendees and Flickr photos. We will also direct people to contest areas, keynote speaches, etc.

Tyson Goodridge is not my PR person, he's right. But he might as well be. Along with the dozens of other people in my Twitterverse who have cited me (@savvyauntie) as an example in their blogs and blog comments on how to create a brand with groundswell support. Or - just to tell others that an online community dedicated to Aunts is coming soon.

When you connect with others on Twitter in an authentic way, reciprocal trust is natural. @johndoe Follows @janesmith. I trust him, so I'll trust her. And from those connections comes genuine word of mouth support, both within the Twitterverse and out. But if you are inauthentic, and you do more Tweeting than Listening, chances are, no one is listening to you either. That's spam, not community.

I am not "using" Twitter to boost my brand. I am engaged in a reciprocal, supportive community of super smart and helpful people who genuinely want to see me and my company succeed. As I truly do theirs. That's why @goodridge wrote that comment above and why I have supported his company (Spire.com) by becoming a Founding Member. It's simple. Twitter karma is good for business. It's certainly be good for mine.

Melanie Notkin
@savvyauntie
Founder, Savvyauntie.com

Heather,

Just saw @baskinrobbins tweeting about this:
"Join us for 31 Cent Scoop Night at Baskin-Robbins®
and help us honor America’s firefighters.
Participating stores will reduce prices of small ice
cream scoops to 31 cents." http://www.baskinrobbins.com/Promotion/31cent.aspx on twitter.

@ahg3

The responses giving individual twitter addresses show scalability for a national franchise will be a problem when one want get to or follow information from one local store in the franchise. But a widget will probable make it way onto a businesses twitter page to search for and make your local connection going forward.

We're an interactive marketing agency, and I'm the Director of SEM (SEO, PPC, Social Media). Just two weeks of twitter got me a speaking gig, and got us at least one really valuable backlink for our corporate site. About half our company is twittering- I'm dragging them in with my incredible enthusiasm. I find it works very well in combination with blogging, commenting on others' blogs, and social bookmarking sites.

I'm @elleinthecity. I work for John Wiley & Sons, a publisher in the NYC area. There are quite a few Wiley people using Twitter. I'm in marketing, and I use it for finding new and creative ways to talk with my current and prospective customers. @chriswebb is an editor who is on twitter to find new authors. He also tweets as @wrox, one of our imprints, and uses twitter to talk with authors and customers. We both use it for instant market research ("Would you buy a book on X?", "What cover would make you more likely to buy this book", etc). I find myself becoming more and more reliant on it to conduct day to day business.

Was looking for a person to help get a startup off the ground, but by following message threads between Twitter members, found a startup (on their first day) devoted to what we were looking for!

I find key persons in the areas we are looking for, and then follow the first people they followed, on the assumption those are the most significant folks to know.

Have gained useful contacts proactively from the reciprocal followers gained who get in touch with me.

Social websites are in the process of getting reformed...some will become more professional/business oriented...we all want to have fun but also need professional envrionments to communicate with partners/associates, etc...in general it is pretty amazign how quickly you cna be in touch with people accross continents...just got back from a bus. trip in Europe and used social network sites to be/stay in touch with friends....
Love it!
www.jbraggiotti.com

Heather....
At H&R Block, we've been using Twitter successfully and have some great stories to tell. Even Robert Scoble has recognized our efforts in Twitter; I'd love to discuss all our Social Media outreach - it really is the unexpected from a company generally perceived as traditional and staid.

I'm editor of Verizon's Policyblog and been on Twitter for about a year.

John "CZ" Czwartacki
aka CZ

I head up marketing at Plaxo and I use social media extensively to engage with our members and potential members. I Twitter every day and use Summize Twitter search frequently to see what people are saying about Plaxo. I reach out to lots of people to answer their questions, help solve problems, or to correct misperceptions they might have. I have been really impressed with the reception I get to that outreach.

Hey everyone,

This is just great. I had no idea!

Hi Everyone!

We at FreshBooks (@freshbooks) have been using Twitter for many months as a way to communicate with our users, handle small support issues and just offer an insight as to what we are up to. Twitter is a great way for us to send a short update on things and of course listen to our customers!

Heck...we even raised money for a charity event we were participating in by making a Twitter request!

Saul Colt
Head of Magic
FreshBooks

We are using Twitter to highlight users, features and customer service @lijit.

In addition, frank from comcast at @comcastcares is doing a fantastic job as is @richardatdell and others.

@micah

Hi Heather,

I saw your tweet and blog post about brands using Twitter and thought I’d share a little about what our Baskin-Robbins team is doing to join the community and the results we’ve experienced. For about a year, we’ve been monitoring and working to build relationships with bloggers. We respond directly to bloggers posting about our brand, ice cream in general, or anything that might show them that the dialog we can engage them in will be meaningful and relevant.

Last night, we joined Twitter as well. We were having our second annual 31 Cent Scoop Night, an event providing consumers with a great deal and honoring America’s fire service community. We monitored Tweetscan earlier to see if anyone was already tweeting about the event and saw a huge feed of Twitterers that had mentioned it. We thought it was a perfect time to join in and actively participate with these Twitterers, or anyone who would like to connect with us on the site.

We were inspired to jump into the Twitter community for this event and hope to use it as a long-term platform to talk directly and regularly with our customers. They can reach us on our Web site, at point of purchase, on our Facebook page, our Flickr page, and a number of other sites. We’re excited to engage with our customers and we’re happy to do that in any means or platform that they enjoy. I would love to talk to you further about our use of social media and Twitter to engage with our customers.

Danielle Sullivan
@BaskinRobbins

I am an online store owner and while I didn't join Twitter to boost and market my business it has helped me business wise tremendously.

Twitter makes connecting to people less formal and fun. I have been able to interact with PR contacts, customers (old and new) and product suppliers in a way only Twitter makes possible.

Twitter to me is being a part of the community. While I might occasionally write a company update, twitter for me is more than just personalizing my brand to me - it literally is just being me. Helping other people with questions not related to my industry or sharing the life behind the business.

And I agree with @savvyauntie - Good twitter karma works. When you give people without asking anything back, it's amazing how much you actually get.

Katja Presnal
owner of Skimbaco.com
@skimbaco

Micah mentioned @comcastcares above. Social Media Insider has a great profile on Frank Eliason and his role at Comcast.
Ann Marie Ricard
Tier One Partners
@ricosly

Would like to add two examples to the conversation. One is how Organic uses Twitter, not just to communicate with each other across our offices in the US, but also Organic extends twitter to real life. Posts to Organic are shown on a plasma screen that greets visitors when they come into the (Detroit) office. Secondly, Government has been joining Twitter. Not just the political candidates but in the last month I've been followed/following Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm and 10DowningStreet (UK Prime Minister). If Government is twittering, businesses absolutely should be doing it as well as part of their social media outreach.

This is a great set of comments. I found a ton of new people to follow!

One company I want to add to the mix is @TVGuide. There is a real person who sends daily tweets of what shows are on TV that evening. I love getting them and have had some fun back-and-forths with David, the person behind the red TV Guide logo.

@KimDushinski

Hi Heather,

Network Solutions uses Twitter to reach out to customers and the community through participation on Twitter. Listening, participating and establishing relationships has been key to us. We use Twitter search tools to reach out to anyone who has questions or needs help with Network Solutions.

I personally extend the relationship further by participating in offline community events.My official title at Network Solutions is Social Media Swami. I am @shashib on Twitter.

Hi Heather,
We're promoting the London West End using Twitter. http://twitter.com/londonwestend

We're posting unique Twitter only offers, 2 for 1 restaurant deals, happy hours, theatre tickets offers, tips on things to do, nights out etc.

Feedback so far has been really positive.

@propellernet

Great comments. I would like to interview businesses using twitter effectively to their advantage. Please check out one and only twitter analysis blog at 2above.com, and get in touch if you are willing to be included. Thanks!